In this issue:

Investigative Lead: Ft. Bragg Special Forces Tied to Reported Anthrax 'Suspect

'Spannaus Senate Race Takes on Bush Democrats

Will the Democratic Party Self-Destruct?

Gore's Home State Shut Down, One of 47 State Budget Crises

Halliburton and the White House: No 'Free Passes'

From the Vol.1 No.18 issue of Electronic Intelligence Weekly

UNITED STATES NEWS DIGEST

Investigative Lead: Ft. Bragg Special Forces Tied to Reported Anthrax 'Suspect'

The fact that information concerning an alleged suspect in the FBI investigation of the anthrax letter attacks that began in October 2001, leads to U.S. Army special forces at Ft. Bragg in Fayetteville, N.C., and to U.S. military connections to Rhodesia/Zimbabwe special warfare operations in Africa, should raise a red flag about the "rogue U.S. military operations" Lyndon LaRouche warned of in his campaign special report of last fall, "Brzezinski and Sept. 11." There, as he warned on the morning of Sept. 11 itself, LaRouche said, "We must examine [the Sept. 11] events as immediately a reflection of an included, intended military coup d'etat, a military rogue operation attempted by a high-ranking, implicitly treasonous element with the U.S. military establishment."

EIR has reportedly extensively about the connections of Ft. Bragg to so-called "Islamic terrorism," through the person of Special Forces Sgt. Ali Mohamed—who pleaded guilty in October 2000, to participating in a terrorist conspiracy "with Osama bin Laden," to murder Americans. Ali Mohamed had been held for over two years before his plea, which related to the 1998 bombings of the U.S. embassies in Nairobi, Kenya, and Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania. Now, information has emerged identifying another special forces operative who has been identified by some as a leading suspect in the anthrax investigation.

A series of articles that appeared in the last two weeks in a broad spectrum of publications—the Independent-on-Line (South Africa) of July 1; the American Prospect of June 27; the Hartford Courant of June 27—name Steven Hatfill as an FBI suspect in the anthrax attacks, whose home was reportedly searched by the FBI on June 26. In those articles, Hatfill has been identified as a senior U.S. scientist who is a biowarfare specialist, who spent much of the 1970s and '80s in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and South Africa, working with right-wing military and paramilitary forces.

Based on those published sources, EIW is raising a serious national security concern about the U.S. biowarfare operations that utilized Hatfill for his expertise, despite his involvement in the racist operations of the Rhodesian military—an army which apparently conducted an anthrax attack on black farmers as part of their operations.

On July 2, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristoff also wrote about the FBI anthrax investigation saying that some people in the bio-defense community think that a man he only identifies as "Mr. Z" is a likely culprit. "If Mr. Z were an Arab national, he would have been imprisoned long ago," writes Kristoff, "But he is a true-blue American with close ties to the U.S. Defense Department, the CIA, and the American biodefense program."

Hatfill and Kristoff's "Mr. Z." have the links to the racist Rhodesian Army, and a deadly anthrax outbreak among black farmers in Rhodesia, that has been identified as a biowarfare attack.

American born, Hatfill worked at the U.S. Army biological weapons research facility at Fort Detrick, Md., from 1997 to 1999, and boasted of an early, extensive history with U.S. special warfare operations at Fort Bragg. Prior to his work at Ft. Detrick, Hatfill also worked at the National Institute of Health (NIH), and later in 1999, moved into working for Science Applications International Corp. (SAIC) in McLean, Va. until this year. In 1999, while at SAIC, reports the Baltimore Sun, he commissioned a study of a hypothetical anthrax attack by mail. - U.S. Covert Operations? -

From 1975-78, Hatfill was with the U.S. Army Institute for Military Assistance at Fort Bragg (the home of the Special Forces), while simultaneously working with the Special Air Squadron (SAS) in Rhodesia. This is according to his own résumé, says the American Prospect. The Institute for Military Assistance began as the Army Psychological Warfare School in the 1950s, and then became the Special Warfare School; it is now known as the JFK School for Special Warfare. Further information on his special warfare background came in June 1998, at a forum at George Washington University, sponsored by the Potomac Institute; Hatfill was introduced as having served with the U.S. Army Special Forces, and having spent 14 months at the Antarctic Research Station doing research for NASA.

The most disturbing element of the profile is that Hatfill's stint in the Rhodesian Army, from 1975-80, and with the notorious Selous Scouts (special unit), coincided with an anthrax outbreak among black farmers that killed 182 and sickened 10,000. The Hartford Courant quotes a former Rhodesian special forces officer who claimed that this anthrax outbreak was a biowarfare attack, launched by the Army. Kristoff also mentions this incident, saying, "There is evidence that the anthrax was released by the white Rhodesian Army fighting against black guerrillas, and Mr. Z has claimed he participated in the white army's much-feared Selous Scouts." Kristoff asks if "rogue elements of the U.S. military" might have backed the Rhodesian Army in anthrax and cholera attacks against Rhodesian blacks.

Hatfill's career is alarming—whether or not he is involved in the U.S. anthrax attacks. And, as Kristoff asks about his "Mr. Z.," why is it "that the U.S. Defense Department would pick an American who had served in the armed forces of two white-racist regimes to work in the American biodefense program with some of the world's deadliest germs?"

Spannaus Senate Race Takes on Bush Democrats

Word was received July 3 that LaRouche Democrat Nancy Spannaus, a well-known political figure in Virginia, has qualified to be on the state ballot as an Independent in November, running for U.S. Senate against incumbent Republican Senator John Warner. Spannaus has run for statewide office several times before.

With Spannaus's ballot status, Lyndon LaRouche's campaign for economic recovery will be on the ballot, and will be organized for, in political forums across Virginia over the next four months.

As far as is known, Spannaus will face two contenders on the ballot, Sen. John Warner and Jacob Hornberger (I), a Libertarian. The Democratic line will say "no candidate."

With the explosion of the telecom/IT/"New Economy" bubble which dominates Northern Virginia's economy, Spannaus's campaign on the basics of LaRouche's economic perspective is expected to have extremely high impact—recalling the effect of Spannaus's leadership of the 1994 effort to defeat Ollie North in his Senate race, an effort that was successful despite the inertia of an otiose Democratic leadership.

Will the Democratic Party Self-Destruct?

Over the recent period, Democratic Presidential pre-candidate Lyndon LaRouche has remarked that one of the major differences between the spectacular economic/financial meltdown crisis of today, and that of the early 1930s, is the fact that there is no Franklin Delano Roosevelt on the scene, except himself. LaRouche was understating the problem. Even worse, Democratic Party officialdom, dominated by the orientation toward Lieberman-McCain, is doing its best to drive Democrats in the FDR tradition out of the party.

The tell-tale sign of the problem is the fact that the party's top election consultants are telling Democrats not to bring up the economic collapse, and how to deal with it, as a major electoral issue.

The exclusion of LaRouche at the top, by DNC chairmen beginning with Don Fowler, is the most suicidal move the party has taken. Nothing underscored this more than Al Gore's loss in Arkansas in the 2000 general election, by almost precisely the same margin of votes which he had stolen from LaRouche in the Democratic Presidential primary that year.

Fundamentally, the reason for excluding LaRouche lies in the desperate attempt of the financial oligarchy controlling the party hacks to suppress the reality of the economic breakdown, and the necessity for his alternative. And, even though this exclusion has driven away millions of voters, the party hacks are prepared to stick to it. And it doesn't stop with LaRouche.

Take the situation in Nevada. There veteran Democratic State Senator Joe Neal, a self-avowed Roosevelt Democrat and 30-year veteran of the State Legislature, has filed to challenge the incumbent Governor, the first-term Republican Kenny Guinn, in this fall's election. While there are three lesser-known Democrats also filed for the Democratic primary, one would think that the Democratic Party would jump at the chance to promote Neal. Yet, the party, in a move reminiscent of the Virginia Democrats, who refused to challenge Republican incumbent Senator John Warner, is backing away from a serious race.

Not only that, but the state AFL-CIO has now come out and endorsed the Republican incumbent.

Neal, who has worked with LaRouche on such policies as opposing energy deregulation, is African-American, has a history as a fighter for civil rights, an opponent of the death penalty, and a strong proponent of increasing taxation on the state's lucrative gambling "industry," in order to put the monies toward underfunded schools. He has been consistently pro-labor, and led the successful fight to stop the ripoff called electricity deregulation.

According to local press coverage, the Democratic Party's spurning of Neal is due to his confrontation with the gaming industry, and to his support for the Yucca Mountain nuclear-waste facility (with certain negotiated qualifications). But it's really Neal's principled commitment to FDR-style policies that's the issue.

Nor is this orientation of the official party a "practical" matter. Take Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Maryland's Lt. Governor, now running for Governor in a totally Democratic state. She decided to recruit a former Republican conservative to join her ticket.

Or take the witchhunt by Democratic Party-affiliated Zionist lobby circles against African-American Democrat Earl Hilliard, in the recent Alabama Democratic primary. Hilliard is a known vote-getter, unlike his opponent.

As the shock deepens, will the real FDR Democrats take their party back?

Gore's Home State Shut Down, One of 47 State Budget Crises

With a budget report recently released from Austin, the state of Texas joined 46 other states facing massive budget deficits. The projected shortfall in the Texas budget is reportedly $5 billion.

However, it was Al Gore's home state of Tennessee which held the budget crisis spotlight in the days leading up to the July 4 holiday. Unable to reach a solution to the crisis by the June 30 end of the fiscal year, despite an all-night session of the state legislature June 30 and an offical stopping of the clock at 11:45 p.m., the state had to declare itself without a budget on Monday, July 1. All but what were described as "essential services" were shut down while the legislature went into emergency session. Some 22,000 state workers were placed on unpaid leave, the state's low-income health-care program, which serves 1.5 million poor people, was operating with a skeleton crew, and residents were being turned away from DMVs and State University classes. As protesters massed outside the state capital, and cars with horns honking circled the capital grounds, legislators debated the merits of introducing a state income tax or increasing Tennessee's already-high sales taxes to paper over an estimated $1.5-billion gap. There was no public acknowledgement that Tennessee's crisis was part of the larger collapse of the world economy, and all plans had a built-in assumption of a non-existent economic recovery.

Finally, late on July 3, the legislature passed an increase of the state sales tax by a penny, passing the burden of the budget crisis onto consumers. No one expected this to be more than a stop-gap measure, and some legislators noted that it would unfairly tax the poor, bringing the sales tax rate up to almost 10% in some parts of the state. Tennessee has no income tax and relies largely on the regressive sales tax for state funding. State Rep. Ulysses Jones, Jr. (D) reportedly commented, "First we had the voodoo budget. Then we had the hoo-doo budget. And the budget we've got now smells, so I call it the doo-doo budget."

It should not be forgotten that during the 2000 Presidential campaign, when Tennessee had in fact a $500-million deficit, candidate Al Gore did not want a budget crisis in his home state, so that fiscal year the legislature solved the budget crisis by simply "revising" the next year's projected tax revenues by $500 million (Gore failed to carry the state anyway). By June 2002, all state reserve monies have already been raided, including the the tobacco funds and the rainy day funds, and the budget has already been cut to the bone. While the world economic collapse was driving the crisis, under pressure from Gore, reality was ignored and politicos started "cooking the books," knowing full well that they would have to face a crisis after the election. They are suffering the consequences of that decision now.

As the Tennessee crisis temporailly abated, Michigan legislators wrestled in marathon sessions with a $700-million budget shortfall, and threatened cuts of $150 million to areas such as fire protection services, disease prevention programs, and art grants. As of July 3, a budget plan approved by the House would raise the cigarette tax by 50 cents to a total of $1.25 a pack (the third highest in the country), delay a planned decrease of the Small Business Tax, and draw down the state's rainy day fund by an estimated $1 billion over three years. Even this budget plan includes a 1% across-the-board cut in state departments. The plan is expected to go to the Senate on July 9, but all kinds of special interest groups are raising single-issue objections, and Michigan could end up deadlocked.

Halliburton and the White House: No 'Free Passes'

Securities and Exchange Commission chairman Harvey Pitt declared, "If anybody violates the law, we go after them," in an interview on ABC-TV's "This Week" on June 30. Asked if Vice President Dick Cheney would "have to pay," were the SEC to find wrongdoing under Mr. Cheney's reign as Halliburton chief, Pitt responded, "I head an independent regulatory agency. We don't give anyone a pass." The SEC is investigating Halliburton Co., an oil company headed by Cheney for several years until August 2000, for improperly booking cost overruns on energy-related construction jobs.

Meanwhile, New York Times economics writer Paul Krugman ran a lengthy story about the dealings of Harken Energy of Texas in 1988-89, where insider trading charges were investigated by the SEC (although ultimately, the SEC decided there was no basis for the charges). Harken Energy was one of President George W. Bush's unsuccessful businesses.

All rights reserved © 2002 EIRNS